


The Piano Knows

by miss_begonia



Category: Bandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, First Time, Kissing, M/M, Piano
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-23
Updated: 2015-07-23
Packaged: 2018-04-10 18:57:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4403426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miss_begonia/pseuds/miss_begonia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ryan maybe, kind of, sort of, possibly…has a crush on his piano teacher. AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Piano Knows

Ryan watches the long curve of Brendon’s spine as he leans into the piano, fingers flicking over the keys, moving, playing, moving, playing.

The notice had said: _Want to learn? I can teach you._

Ryan had slid his finger under the sheet of purple paper tacked to the freshman dorm bulletin board, lifted it slightly, inhaled and thought: _Why not._

_Why not._

 

Brendon has been playing piano since he was three. This is what he tells Ryan as Ryan crouches on the narrow bench beside him and tries to keep their thighs from touching.

“They said I was a prodigy or something,” Brendon says with a roll of his eyes. “Which is total b.s. – I’m not Mozart or whatever, I just like music.”

His eyes are warm, a smooth dark roasted coffee brown. His hair sticks up at odd angles but curls around his ears. When he plays he closes his eyes and parts his lips, his eyelashes feathering against his cheeks like fringe on the dresses of dancers.

“Wow,” Ryan says as Brendon finishes a Chopin nocturne and lifts his hands from the keys. “I think I like music too.”

 

Spencer laughs at Ryan when he talks about Brendon, says, “Somebody’s hot for teacher.”

Ryan frowns and says, “You don’t get it.”

And Spencer doesn’t. Get it.

 

Watching Brendon play feels like a strange invasion, like he’s seeing something private and intimate and secret. When Ryan watches Brendon he feels like he’s the only person who ever gets to see this, to see Brendon like this. He knows it’s not true, but it doesn’t matter. For that single hour each week Brendon’s music is Ryan’s too, and nothing matters but the lock of Brendon’s shoulders and the curve of his fingers and the tap-tap of his foot along with the rhythm against the carpet, soft, barely audible, an undercurrent to the melody like their quiet exhalations. They share breath.

 

Ryan does learn, slowly. Music isn’t natural or instinctual for him, but he can learn. He practices and he plays and he listens and slowly, slowly he begins to enjoy the feel of the keys under his fingertips, narrow and slippery and pliable like the strings they control inside.

Ryan learns about control. Brendon says, “It’s about technique, yes. You have to have good technique.” He says, “You have to learn the rules.” He says, “There is a right way to do this.” He moves Ryan’s hands into position, corrects his posture with a push and a tug, shows him how to shape chords and slide through scales and trill grace notes and read complicated notation that turns messy black and incomprehensible before Ryan’s eyes.

He teaches Ryan all these things and then he sits back, folds his hands in his lap, fixes Ryan with his intense gaze and says, “Now you know the rules.”

“I think I do,” Ryan stutters. “I think—”

“Break them,” Brendon says.

 

One afternoon Brendon plays Chopin’s Fantasie-Impromptu in C-Minor. Ryan isn’t even close to being able to play such a thing, but it’s what Brendon’s working on for his recital and Ryan is curious and wants to hear it.

The piece is all over the place, just like so much of Chopin’s music – soft, then dramatic and loud, fast and trembling like a hummingbird’s wings, then slow and sweet like unrushed touch. Brendon plays with complete focus, brow furrowed, lower lip caught between his teeth, but as the piece goes on his face relaxes into a small, sleepy smile.

Brendon is there, and he’s beautiful, and Ryan’s wanted to since – since the day he walked in that door and saw Brendon sitting there, playing, the instrument so much a part of him it was like the music was coming through him, shivering out through his fingertips and into the air.

And so he kisses him.

“…Oh,” Brendon says softly, and draws back. 

The light in the room is dim now that the sun’s gone down, the only illumination coming from the lamp clipped onto the frame of the ebony Baby Grand. Ryan can see Brendon’s lips moving as if he’s trying to form words, but none come out.

“I’m sorry,” Ryan says, and goes.

 

Ryan thinks about not going to Brendon’s recital, considers it. But then he finds himself walking towards the concert hall anyway, hands stuffed into the pockets of his puffy down jacket, boots crunching through the dry fallen leaves. Snow falls around him, onto him, getting stuck in his eyelashes, freezing his nose. He clenches his hands in his pockets and wishes his gloves weren’t fingerless.

He knows no one there and sits alone. When Brendon walks onto the stage Ryan leans forward in his seat, feeling his breath go shallow. 

He’s perfect. Not that Ryan would know if he messed up, not really. Ryan doesn’t have a practiced ear like Brendon does, but everything sounds lovely and light and clean.

When Brendon stands to take a bow to thunderous applause, he lets his eyes scan over the crowd. Ryan stands too, clapping, part of the ovation, and Brendon blinks, slowly, and smiles. 

Ryan thinks: _He can’t see me. He can’t_. 

He doesn’t stay to find out.

 

Two months later Ryan runs into Brendon in the music building while he’s waiting for Spencer, who’s started playing drums in Jazz Band. Spencer asked about the lessons at first, wanted to know why Ryan stopped, but Ryan just said: _I didn’t have time to practice_. Spencer gave him one long, knowing look, but said nothing.

Brendon stares at Ryan, opens his mouth, then closes it. Ryan moves as if to go around him, but Brendon puts out a hand, presses it against Ryan’s chest, and says, firmly, “No.”

“No?” Ryan asks stupidly.

“You’re not running away again,” Brendon says. 

He lifts his chin and looks at Ryan straight on.

“Running away?” Ryan says. He’s become as repetitive as a metronome.

“I saw you,” Brendon says. “You came to the recital.”

Ryan flushes, hunching his shoulders and looking at the floor.

“You’re good,” Ryan says. 

It’s such a ridiculous understatement, but he doesn’t think he can say _you’re amazing, you’re fantastic, you’re better than anyone I’ve ever met_ without feeling like an ass.

“Thank you,” Brendon says. “Also, you’re kind of an idiot.”

Ryan’s head snaps up. “What?”

Brendon steps into Ryan’s space, cups one of his hands around the back of Ryan’s neck, and kisses him.

Brendon kisses like he plays – focused and confident, with occasional teasing flicks of his tongue like the tripping dance of hands over keys.

“You—” Ryan starts to say, but Brendon presses his finger to Ryan’s lips.

“No,” Brendon says. “You were so scared all the time, Ryan. You played everything exactly how the sheet music told you to, but you never pushed beyond it. You were good. The only thing holding you back was you.”

“But I—”

“You kissed me first,” Brendon reminds him. “That wasn’t scared. That took guts.”

Ryan wants to say, _I didn’t know what else to do_. He wants to say, _I couldn’t sit in that room any longer without kissing you_. 

“You broke the rules,” Brendon says. 

His hand slides over Ryan’s cheek, warm and soft. 

“I’m sorry—”

“Don’t be sorry!” Brendon exclaims. His hand slides down over Ryan’s shoulder, squeezing. “Break them again.”

His voice twists up Ryan’s spine, lies there along his nerve endings, a dry heat.

“Break them with me.”

 

Ryan still loves to watch Brendon play. He loves watching him concentrate, squint, purse his lips, make funny faces at the sheet music. He loves the way Brendon talks about music, gesticulating with his hands, face alive and eyes bright. He loves the way Brendon teaches, how patient he is but how firm.

Sometimes they sit together on the bench, Brendon a warm body against his side, elbows nudging into his space, messing up his fingering. They play duets, stupid simple things Ryan can keep up with, and Brendon hums along, making up words for songs that don’t have any. Ryan leans over until their shoulders brush, and Brendon turns and kisses his ear, his cheek, his neck, kisses him until Ryan loses his place. 

Brendon plays a pretty melody, elegant and sweet, an excerpt from Chopin, a sentence from the novel that is the Impromptu in C-Minor.

And then he whispers, soft against Ryan’s cheek: “Now you.”


End file.
